The Mighty Shiz: Model up the X axis parts in Fusion

Next up will be the corresponding X axis bracket and cover. Like the rest of the system, This was modelled up originally in Solidworks but now needs to be recreated in Fusion. You can import SW files into Fusion but that way they don't have any parametric data or design history. And although you can do some minor direct editing of those solid bodies in Fusion, it's nothing like as powerful as having the sketches available for modification.

So I imported the original SW models into Fusion, created 2D drawings from them and dimensioned up the key features. From these dimensioned drawings its fairly quick and easy to create 2D design sketches in Fusion and thence the final 3D models and assemblies. Sounds a bit involved and possibly a bit oblique but in fact it's pretty straightforward. The imported models are pretty much exactly what I want, so creating 2D drawings helps to manually transcribe them into Fusion. It works for me.

There are many ways you could go about workholding most jobs and this tarpicular one is potentially a little tricky due to the lack of parallel faces. I suppose I could use a variety of clamps and bolts, moving them around to give access to the various faces of the stock as work progresses but that's a pain, not least because I currently have the machine vise as the preferred workholding method. This is due to the machine guards that pretty much prevent me from holding work close to the table. With the knee / table high enough to work that way, the machine guards would foul the head and console. I plan to remove the guards once I have figured out how to fit alternative guards (probably shower curtains or clear PCV strips). As it is, the guards only contain some of the swarf and coolant, the rest flying all over the floor / walls / windows etc.

So my planned approach is:

Machine the features on the "bottom" surface of the body including the main external profiling. I will bolt a piece of stock to the "top" of the stock which will be held in the machine vise. The bolts will mate with material that will be removed in the second operation, so there will be no trace afterwards and no tabs etc to be removed:

Face off the stock.
Drill through (12mm or so) the axes of both large bores.
Rough and finish bore the 2 cylindrical openings to a depth of around 12mm.
2D Adaptive to clear the external profile.
2D Contour to finish the external profle
Drill the four M4 tapping holes for the motor fixings.
Mill out the tensioner slot.
Chamfer / break the edges.

Flip the part, hold it in soft jaws and then clear out the internal cavity.

2D Adaptive to clear the cavity.
2D Contour to finish the cavity.
M3 and M4 tapping drill for the cover screws.
Chamfer / break edges.

So, I will need to make up some sets of soft jaws using the 1" x 2" loominum I bought for this purpose. I removed the original hard jaws that came with the Chinese Kurt clone and measured up the key features. The jaws are held in place with two M8 hex socket cap head bolts which are a pretty loose fit in the jaw holes. Using those dimensions as a basis, this is what my soft jaws in 1" x 2" stock will look like:

And within the CAD (model) environment, it's fairly simple to use the main body to cut the required chunk from the soft jaws once you've positioned them where they need to be: